Undead Observer
by AlchemyWriter
Summary: Everyone is the hero of their own story. Ever heard that? Well, it depends on the story. The hero of this story happens to be my friend, Darren Shan. What's my story? To help his story reach a happy ending.
1. Chapter 1

**Hello, everybody! I was hesitant to write this story, as it wasn't the type that I usually write, not only in first person, but with an OC as the main character. However, I decided, fuck it, and here we are.**

**Darren Shan owns himself. He also owns the fictional vampire version of himself, and the series of books that his fictional vampire self is the main character of. I claim nothing but my OC.**

There are so many ways to start a book. Herman Melville startedhis book _Moby Dick _with the line, "Call me Ishmael." Charles Dickens starts _A Christmas Carol _with, "Marley was dead, to begin with." I even know of a series where the first book starts with the line, "I've always been fascinated by spiders."

Actually, let me correct myself. I know of a series that WILL start with the line, "I've always been fascinated by spiders." You see, it hasn't been written yet. How do I know this? Well, I think that it started with my death. The first one, anyway.

I don't remember much of my first life. Nothing, really. Hell, I don't even remember how I _died._ All that I do remember about it is that I loved the Cirque du Freak series, also known as The Saga of Darren Shan. And through that, the story begins.

I also don't remember what the afterlife was like. Maybe that's for the best. What I do remember from it is that I was approached by beings that I couldn't make out. Call it convenient, but even without seeing what they were, I knew they were the vampire gods. How did I know? No idea.

They must have addressed me by name, but I draw a blank when I think of it. This is what I do remember.

"What do you want?"

"We are aware of the book series you love. Your knowledge could be useful to us."

"How?"

"While we are aware of Mr. Tiny's interference, we cannot stop him ourselves. We cannot even change what will happen, as it would violate the laws."

"What? What? Sorry, I need a minute to process this. The Saga of Darren Shan is _real?_ I mean, you are the vampire gods, so I shouldn't be surprised, but _really?"_

I took a deep breath (even though I didn't need to breathe) and was able to calm myself.

"Okay, I think I understand. You know about Mr. Tiny's creation of Darren Shan and Steve Leonard, and you want to stop his plans. How could my knowledge of the series help you?"

"With your consent, we can give you new life. Reincarnate you, so to speak, as an observer to help Darren Shan through to the end."

"But Darren Shan already wrote the books, and nothing like what happened in the books happened-"

"Are you familiar with multiverse theory?"

I stopped talking at that. It was all the explanation that I needed. I could put the rest together for myself. As the beings in front of me watched, I considered the pros and cons of accepting the offer.

The cons first: if I agreed, I'd need to be blooded as a vampire, meaning that I'd need to abandon my new family, fake my death, and feed off of humans to survive. I'd have to observe, only helping point things in the right direction if necessary. I couldn't save anyone with my knowledge of the future. I couldn't tell anybody about my future knowledge. I'd need to face the Trials at some point (was not looking forward to that). To cap it off, I'd need to become friends with Darren Shan to begin with, and force myself not to keep Steve Leopard away from him before the Cirque.

The pros: While the Cirque du Freak vampires aren't the classic-type vampires, being one would be better than being a vampire from, say, Twilight. I'd also likely start as a half-vampire, like Darren, meaning that I'd get the best of both worlds. I could also become badass with a sword or other hand-to-hand weapons.

I weighed the options carefully, before asking another question.

"If I accept, what about my memories?"

The reply wasn't great.

"Your memories will be removed, as they would only be a distraction. You will remember this conversation, and retain your knowledge of The Saga of Darren Shan, but nothing else."

With that in mind, I thought about it. As much as I loved my family, I was dead and gone. They would never see me again. The best they could do would be to remember and move on. And if I remembered _them, _I wouldn't move on. It was then that I made the hardest decision of my (very short) afterlife.

"I accept."

I spoke those words, and immediately everything went black. Not completely, but enough that I couldn't see anything. I heard a thumping noise, and other muffled noises, but they never got clearer. I was also unable to move much, before being curled back into a ball. I don't know how long it lasted, but based on the first clear words I heard when I was free, I suspect that it was about nine months.

There was a bright light, and the first words I heard were,

"Congratulations, it's a boy."

-Line Break-

So, there's my backstory. Or, at least, that's how I know what will happen. In terms of how things went regarding my life leading up to the Cirque, the vampire gods must have been helping me.

I'm Nathan Hill, or Nate. That might be my name, or it might not be. You'll never know. I was American by birth, but moved to Europe with my parents when I was fairly young. Through luck or vampire god intervention, we ended up as neighbors to the Shans, and befriending Darren was simple. We had our own interests, his being spiders, mine being antique cars, but we both liked soccer, so I befriended Alan Morris and Tommy Jones as well. I jokingly asked once why they called it soccer when we weren't in the United States, and they had no idea.

When Darren and I met Steve Leopard, I immediately tried to distance myself. Unfortunately, I couldn't. Steve was actually pretty cool, and we had something in common besides eventually becoming creatures of the night, and that was a love of comics. I never felt comfortable around him, but I did befriend Steve to an extent.

The five of us, Darren, Steve, Alan, Tommy, and myself, had pretty normal childhoods. We went to school, played games, read comics, kept secrets from our parents, all the usual stuff. Well, it was usual, before the freak show came to town.


	2. Chapter 2

The day started out fairly normally. We were at school, and my friends and I were playing soccer during the lunch break. Darren wasn't with us, as he'd been feeling sick towards the end of our English class, and our teacher, Mr. Dalton, had sent him to the bathroom. I knew from the books that Darren wasn't actually going to be sick, but I also knew why he was taking so long to come outside.

Our team was losing badly, thanks to the fact that the good players were either gone or out of commission. Darren was our last hope for victory, and Steve had gone to find him. I was no slouch when it came to soccer, but Tommy and Darren were the better players in our friend group. I saw the other team score a goal as I searched for Darren and Steve. Great. Now we were down eight goals.

"Never fear, Hotshot Shan is here!"

I heard Darren's voice and saw him come on to the field.

"What were you doing in there, Darren? Were you coughing up a lung? We needed you!"

I wasn't really annoyed, but decided to be a little snarky. He laughed it off, and we went back to the game. Of course, we lost, considering Darren's late entry, but we got close to a tie, so it wasn't too bad. I was walking with Tommy, Darren, and Steve, when Alan Morris ran up. I saw the flyer in his hand, and I got a little excited…and a little scared.

"Look what I found!" Alan cried, while he waved the paper in our faces.

"What is it?" Tommy tried to grab it from him.

Alan started to explain, but was cut off by Mr. Dalton, who told us to come inside. I already knew what the flyer was, but I was still interested to see it.

As I followed the other four guys back into the school, I thought about how Darren said in the book that they were probably the weirdest guys on Earth because only one of them had a nickname. I'd never understood that, and even now, I still don't. Nicknames suit some people better than others, and Steve Leopard was a more than fitting name for the boy who would grow up to become the Vampaneze Lord. I ignored those thoughts, however, and we walked to class.

-Line Break-

I was simultaneously happy and worried to see the flyer throughout history and math. When Alan was finally persuaded to show it, he passed it to Tommy, who passed it to Darren, who sat close enough for me to see it. It looked pretty cool, and if I didn't know that only two people could go, I might have been interested in seeing it.

My thoughts were interrupted by Mr. Dalton swooping in like a bat and grabbing the flyer.  
"What is this?" he asked in an angry voice.

Darren gave the answer.

"It's an advertisement, sir."

"Where'd you get it?" I can't begin to describe the anger that was on Mr. Dalton's face. "Where'd you get it?"

Steve stepped in to save Alan, claiming that the flyer was his. Mr. Dalton calmed down at that, and put the flyer on the bulletin board for all to see.

"Long ago, there used to be real freak shows. Greedy con men crammed malformed people in cages and-"

A girl interrupted him, asking what 'malformed' meant, and Mr. Dalton explained. I decided to throw my own question into the discussion.

"Mr. Dalton, do you mean people like in The Elephant Man? With John Hurt?"

Mr. Dalton seemed to like that I understood what he was talking about.

"Yes, Nate. Joseph Merrick is a good example of the kind of people who were trapped in freak shows. I'm glad that you know about that."

Mr. Dalton continued to talk about freak shows and how awful they were, before the class really was able to get back to actual math. When class ended, Steve was able to convince Mr. Dalton to let him keep the flyer (though he cut the address off the bottom). Steve held on to it until the end of the day. We met outside the building and looked over the flyer.

"It's got to be a fake," Darren said.

"Why?" asked Alan.

"They don't allow freak shows anymore. Wolf-men and snake-boys were outlawed years ago. Mr. Dalton said so."

_You'll be singing a different tune real soon, Shan, _I thought when I heard him say that.

Alan continued to insist that the flyer was real, explaining that he stole it from his brother Tony, who had once decided to give me a Wet Willie that I was fairly certain I still hadn't fully recovered from. And that was him being merciful.

"Where did Tony get it?" Darren asked Alan.

"There was a guy passing them out in an alley. One of the circus performers, a Mr. Crepsley." _Ah, yes. The character that every Darren Shan fangirl wanted to be shipped with, and every other fan wanted to ship with twelve-year-old Darren Shan. I really hope that I can convince him to blood me, because I don't want to be the same species as those weirdos!_

Upon hearing how much the tickets were, we all freaked, pun not intended.

I wasn't bothered, because even though I had no plans to visit the freak show with Darren and Steve, I'd been saving my allowance for a while to be prepared. As the other guys talked about how they would pay that much to see the freaks, I cut in.

"They probably don't pass out many flyers, to avoid the police and people like Mr. Dalton. As a result, the ticket prices have to be higher to compensate for the lack of people in attendance."

"Sure," Steve said, "but we don't have the twenty-three bucks to throw away. So it's academic, isn't it?"

I had more than enough to buy a ticket, but when they asked me, I told them that the show didn't interest me. I would have donated some of it to them, but I wanted to keep things as they were, so I didn't screw anything up. Steve and the others looked annoyed at me, but didn't push the issue. Steve said that he'd borrow some money from his mom's money jar, and pay it back later. We went home after that, and I started to prepare.

-Line Break-

I guess that I could talk about my family for a bit. There isn't really much to say. They're good friends with Darren's parents, as we live next door, so we invited them over for dinner a lot. I doubted that they'd care too much about the freak show, or if I went out after dark. I didn't have a curfew, unlike my friends, and if something happened, then they'd say that I had nobody to blame but myself.

Was it a good parenting style? Not always. However, I never had an issue with it, as I could take care of myself. They respected my privacy, and we didn't always talk to one another. That doesn't mean that I didn't love my parents, I certainly did. It would be hard to leave them and fake my death, but I was more concerned with what would happen it I didn't go through with it. I had trouble falling asleep that night, because of my rapidly-approaching choice.

-Line Break-

When Steve didn't show up at school the next morning, I was forced to put up with Darren, Alan, and Tommy looking disappointed. When Steve did show up, I joined the others in mobbing him and asking questions.

"Come on Steve, don't mess around with us," Darren said, "Did you get them or not?"

"Yes and no," was the reply.

"What does _that _mean?"

"It means I have some good news, some bad news, and some crazy news. Which do you want to hear first?"

"_Crazy _news?" asked Darren.

"Come on, Leonard, out with it! What is this crazy news that you have, and will it stop this freak show obsession?" I said, equal parts sarcasm and curiosity.

Steve began to whisper.

"I got the money, and sneaked out at seven o'clock, when Mom was on the phone. I hurried across town to the ticket booth, but do you know who was there when I arrived?"

"Who?"

"Mr. Dalton! He was there with a couple of policemen. They were dragging a small guy out of the booth – it was only a small shed, really – when suddenly there was this huge bang and a big cloud of smoke covered them all. When it cleared, the small guy had disappeared."

As Steve told his story, I stood back. I was a little nervous. Now was the time for anyone like the vampire gods or Mr. Tiny to interfere and change something, like that the Cirque sold only _three _tickets per flyer instead of two like in the book, but that fear was unfounded. Steve was only able to get two tickets, and only two people could go to the show.

I decided to listen to them argue about who got the tickets. Steve was a no-brainer, but the problem came with the other ticket. Alan thought he should get it because he brought the flyer, Darren said that Steve should choose, Tommy didn't want to draw straws due to his bad luck. I didn't say anything. I didn't want to change anything. Steve gave them his plan for deciding who would get the ticket, and we all moved into position for Steve to throw the fake tickets and the real one over us. On the count of three, it happened. I grabbed at the paper for appearance's sake, and managed to catch a few pieces of paper. I held them up to make it clear that I didn't have the ticket, and watched the others search.

"What's in your hands, Darren?"

"He doesn't have it. He can't have. He had his eyes shut."

"Maybe so, but there's _something _in those fists of his."

"Open them. Let's see what you're hiding."

I watched Darren open his right hand to reveal nothing, and then his left. Sure enough, he had the ticket. As Darren and Steve celebrated, I sighed, looking around to take my mind off of what was coming. As I did, I noticed something. Standing across the street from the school was a man in a yellow suit and green boots, with white hair, thick glasses, and a pudgy face. He wasn't looking at me, but at Darren and Steve. And even from the distance between us, I could tell that he was smiling.

Tearing my eyes away from Mr. Tiny, I turned to congratulate my friends, wishing them a fun time, while panicking on the inside.

It had begun.


End file.
